Many people have told me many OTAs as their preferred booking choice. I agree they do sometimes give a very good deal. But when it comes to making a change or cancellation, you will get to understand why it is better to always stick to booking with the airline. I'm giving you a tip right away, use all the OTAs, and book with the airline unless you are absolutely sure your plans won't change and the offer by the OTA is too good to refuse.
The trip in 2016 that I had mentioned to Paris, I had booked through an OTA because of an offer that was too good to overlook INR 10,000 cash back per passenger. I had applied for my Schengen visa and it had got rejected. That is when I contacted the OTA to cancel my tickets and realised I cannot. In fact, they asked me to pay extra to cancel the tickets. I applied for the visa through another travel agent who happened to know a relative in my family quite well. I got my visa just 5 days before the actual travel date. Phew!
Another important tip that I cannot stress enough is join the airline loyalty program. You might think there are a million airlines and you would never know if you're going to fly this airline again. But trust me, it costs nothing to sign up for a loyalty program. Barring an email a week, there is no bigger inconvenience by doing this. If you have already signed up for an airline which is part of the One World Alliance, you can use that airline's frequent flier number with any of the other airlines on the One World Alliance. For example, I had signed up for Qatar Airways program when I flew to Paris in 2016. I had used the same account information to book my flight to Colombo later next year. One other major alliance is Star Alliance. Air India is a part of this alliance. When I had flew Lufthansa to Austria in the end of 2014, I had used my Air India frequent flyer account. Never ever, fly again, without adding a frequent flyer number on your boarding pass. You can do it as late as your check-in even if you forgot during booking.
Where do I check for flight deals? As any blogger would say, Google Flights is the simplest and often the most convenient to track. One other software I use is matrix ITA software which is also owned by Google. All the rest is up to you to check. Read the first paragraph again on where to book.
That's all folks! I'll be back in my next post with how and where I book my hotels and why it is not a good thing always to pre-book everything.
The trip in 2016 that I had mentioned to Paris, I had booked through an OTA because of an offer that was too good to overlook INR 10,000 cash back per passenger. I had applied for my Schengen visa and it had got rejected. That is when I contacted the OTA to cancel my tickets and realised I cannot. In fact, they asked me to pay extra to cancel the tickets. I applied for the visa through another travel agent who happened to know a relative in my family quite well. I got my visa just 5 days before the actual travel date. Phew!
Another important tip that I cannot stress enough is join the airline loyalty program. You might think there are a million airlines and you would never know if you're going to fly this airline again. But trust me, it costs nothing to sign up for a loyalty program. Barring an email a week, there is no bigger inconvenience by doing this. If you have already signed up for an airline which is part of the One World Alliance, you can use that airline's frequent flier number with any of the other airlines on the One World Alliance. For example, I had signed up for Qatar Airways program when I flew to Paris in 2016. I had used the same account information to book my flight to Colombo later next year. One other major alliance is Star Alliance. Air India is a part of this alliance. When I had flew Lufthansa to Austria in the end of 2014, I had used my Air India frequent flyer account. Never ever, fly again, without adding a frequent flyer number on your boarding pass. You can do it as late as your check-in even if you forgot during booking.
Where do I check for flight deals? As any blogger would say, Google Flights is the simplest and often the most convenient to track. One other software I use is matrix ITA software which is also owned by Google. All the rest is up to you to check. Read the first paragraph again on where to book.
That's all folks! I'll be back in my next post with how and where I book my hotels and why it is not a good thing always to pre-book everything.
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